The Calling

by Ken Altabef

  Halfway across the channel the floe tipped completely and the sled went over, dragging all the dogs down into the water. Muraoq and Old Manatook were left trapped on the bare ice, without sled or team, adrift at the mouth of the Forked River.

  “Why not ask the river for help?” asked Alaana.

  “That’s no use,” said Old Manatook.

  “He did just that,” said Nunavik. “As I recall, he went down on hands and knees, begging for his life, there on the ice.”

  “River spirits are aloof and distracted. They are not easily swayed.”

  “By the young and inexperienced,” added Nunavik smartly.

  “Hmmf. Yes, I was young once,” huffed Old Manatook.

  “If you can believe it,” snickered Nunavik. “He didn’t always smell this bad either.”

  “We drifted for two sleeps, without boat or team,” continued Old Manatook, “when things turned even worse. A hunting party of the Chukchee found us as we lay sleeping on the ice. They took hold of us, recognizing me as a shaman. They intended to keep me as a slave, bound hand and foot, until such time as I pledged my service to them. Failing that, they vowed to pry my secrets from me at the edge of a blade. As proof of their grim intentions, they drilled Muraoq through the head.”

  “Why not ask the binds to release?” asked Alaana.

  “The ropes had already been convinced otherwise.”

  “The Chukchee had a better shaman,” said Nunavik dryly.

  “In time, my chance came and I took it,” continued Old Manatook. “I ran from the enemy camp, but I could only get to the shore and no further. A hundred paces of fast-moving water separated me from the next island.”

  “What did you do?” asked Alaana.

  “The only thing he could do. He called me for help,” said Nunavik.

  Alaana thought she picked up a small sound coming across from the other practice iglu, something like a low growl.

  “When I saw the pathetic state he was in,” continued Walrus On The Ice, “I turned toward the sea and called my brethren. Hah! You should have seen it! They came. Indeed, they all came, so many, so many — as numerous as shells on the beach. They lined up in the water, all the fine bull walruses of Nunatsiaq, and Manatook simply walked across to the next island, his feet passing atop the flats of their heads.”

  “It didn’t stop the Chukchee from coming after,” said Old Manatook. “I had bought some time to think while they manned their boats, but I was trapped again, and with the enemy bearing down fast.”

  “So what did you do?” asked Alaana.

  “Yes, what did you do?” chimed Nunavik.

  Old Manatook’s response was muffled. Alaana leaned forward intently, sifting through the strands of the air for any message on its way across. She shook her head. “I’m sorry teacher, I didn’t hear that properly. My skill at receiving is not what it should be. Say again?”

  “Not your fault,” said Nunavik to Alaana. Then he projected loudly, “Heya! You crusty old man! We didn’t hear that. Speak up!”

  “I asked for help,” said Old Manatook.

  “Yes once again.” The old walrus bobbed his golden, though slightly misshapen, head in a show of glee.

  “That’s what helper spirits are for, isn’t it?” growled Old Manatook.

  Nunavik was quick to take offense. “Helper spirit my big bulging backside! I taught you more than Balikqi ever did.”

  “Who’s Balikqi?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” answered Old Manatook, ignoring Alaana’s question. “It was I taught you how to travel to the Moon and the Celestial world, and don’t you forget it. An entire world which you didn’t even know existed. Of the seven worlds, you only had six until you met me.”

  “My blood, the Moon didn’t help you so very much stuck on that island, did he?” Nunavik turned toward Alaana, “It’s a good thing I felt sorry for him. I couldn’t help myself, he looked so pathetic…”

  “Pathetic? This comes from a piece of ivory tusk? I could’ve tossed you into the water, and still I might. You’d never be found again.”

  Nunavik grumbled loudly. “Maybe you should have thrown me away. But not surprisingly, you didn’t. Perhaps you were too busy begging me to help you out of danger once again.”

  Alaana chuckled. “Tell me, Uncle Walrus, what did you do?”

  “Sunk their boats. All but one, since I supposed our junior shaman might need a way to get home.”

  “It’s not much of a story beyond that,” said Old Manatook. “That left one boat and her crew still coming onto the island. They left their kinsmen floundering in the icy water. The blood feud was in their hearts. They wanted so much to kill me.”

  “Oh, but that’s not the end,” said Alaana. “What happened?”

  “Hmmf. I killed them all and took their boat. The first I killed with a spear throw. It was a spectacular throw. Three hundred paces.”

  “With a little help,” snorted Nunavik. “His aim was off.”

  “What’s this?”

  “I guided that spear. You would’ve missed.”

  “Nonsense! I never miss.”

  “Hah!” barked the Walrus. “Listen to that! Whatever happened to the essential humility of the shaman?”

  “Humility is one thing. Accuracy is another. The first I killed, with no assistance from anyone at all, with a spear throw. The second I stabbed in the groin with his own knife, and the third I strangled to death. In that way I satisfied my own blood feud. I had not forgotten the drilling of my friend, Muraoq.”

  Deep in winter’s long night, Alaana lay unable to sleep. Her father’s constant tossing and turning on the platform was keeping the whole family awake.

  Finally Kigiuna sat up on the bed.

  Alaana peered over at him, but the wick on the soapstone lamp had burned down so low she couldn’t see anything. In the gloom of the family iglu Kigiuna didn’t seem to notice her.

  “Wake up,” he said. “Amauraq, wake up.”

  Amauraq sat up, slowly coming awake. “What’s wrong?”

  “Louse me.”

  Without a word she brought the fish-oil lamp closer to the sleeping platform. As the warm sphere of yellow light distinguished the two of them against the icy soot-grayed walls, Alaana watched her mother bending over her husband’s scalp, going through his hair looking for the nits.

  Kigiuna let out a long, low sigh and Alaana knew it was more than just a few biting lice that was bothering him.

  “Alaana spends too much time with Old Manatook.” Kigiuna spoke in a sad voice instead of his usual strong, imperious tone. “She should also learn how to sew the skins, how to cook. She should be spending time with you and Pilarqaq.”

  Alaana thought this suggestion sounded pretty good, but there was little hope for change.

  “She is learning important things,” whispered Amauraq. “There are other things than skins and kettle pots.”

  “How do I know what she’s learning?” asked Kigiuna loudly. Pilarqaq’s snoring ceased abruptly, and Alaana realized the rest of the family must also be awake, though nobody dared to speak or sit up. “She’s my daughter. How do I know what Old Manatook’s filling her head with? She won’t talk about it.”

  “She can’t,” whispered Amauraq.

  “Can’t.”

  They sat for a few moments in silence, with the exception of an occasional snap as Amauraq cracked the nits between her teeth.

  “Trust Old Manatook,” she said softly. “He’s been our shaman as long as I can remember, and things have been well.”

  “I seem to remember there were times we went hungry,” said Kigiuna. “People died for want of food. Men perished out on the ice. Sickness came among us. Have you forgotten?”

  “No,” she hissed, “I have not.” Her tone was heavy with a note of painful loss, and Alaana knew who she was thinking about. Nearly a full year had gone by, and Ava was still very much in their thoughts. “But it’s not good to speak of those things,” she continued. “It’s
not Old Manatook’s fault people break the taboos. The spirits are powerful and dangerous. They are things common people can’t understand or control.”

  “I’ve not seen any of it,” grumbled Kigiuna. “The wind is just the wind. The snow is just the snow.”

  “Only the shaman can see those things.”

  “Does he? He appeals to the spirits and turgats, yet it’s my two strong hands that bring in the kill. It’s the patience of the hunters, our courage out on the ice, our skill.”

  Maguan made a vague grunting noise meant to sound as if he were turning in his sleep. Alaana suspected her brother was offering some small measure of support for Kigiuna’s position, from one hunter to another. Kigiuna was neither a shaman nor a man of any great importance, but his bravery, and his strength, could never be questioned.

  Amauraq paused to dig a fingernail into the louse she’d just caught, cutting it in half. “You were there with the rest of us in front of the karigi. You saw them fight the demon.”

  “I saw them die. That was all I saw.”

  “They healed the people, they saved Alaana.”

  “But not Ava.”

  The mention of her sister’s name brought down a wall of stony silence. It was not unusual for any of them to mention her by name, but only in reference to some happy moment of shared memory. They did not refer to her death. Alaana peeked out from her sleeping furs. Her mother’s face had become a frozen mask.

  “Quipagaa led my people through the pass,” she said softly.

  “Your grandfather? You were only a child then. You don’t remember. That’s nothing more than an old story.”

  “It is not.” Amauraq spoke softly, but firmly.

  Annoyed at her insolence, Kigiuna slapped her hand away from his scalp. “I said it is,” he growled.

  Having said her piece, Amauraq allowed her husband the final word. There really was no point in arguing the matter. The conversation lapsed as Amauraq’s fingers worked their way along the long black hair that trailed down the back of Kigiuna’s neck.

  “I’m worried for Alaana,” said Kigiuna. “She’s not eating, not sleeping. Spending so much time with the old man. I don’t like it.”

  Her father’s words threatened to break Alaana’s heart. The rift between her father and the shaman deeply worried her, and it was all the worse now she heard it from Kigiuna’s own lips. Alaana’s new responsibilities consumed so much of her time, she had been so distracted by the urgency of the training. She must find a way to make it clear to Kigiuna that her growing fondness for the shaman did not threaten her love for her real father.

  Amauraq’s sigh rustled through the iglu. “She was always different, wandering off alone all the time. Staring at the river or the mountains. Or the birds. It’s a difficult thing she does, our little one. But I have no doubt.” She cracked another nit with her teeth and spit out the pieces. “She’s a very strong girl.”

  “She doesn’t look well.”

  “Something better will come of it. Something important.”

  Kigiuna clicked his tongue dismissively, “How can you say that?”

  “Because I believe it is true,” said Amauraq.

  “She isn’t happy,” said Kigiuna flatly. “She hasn’t been happy since this whole thing started. She doesn’t smile anymore.”

  Alaana hadn’t realized she’d been acting that way at all. She had been laughing just that morning in the practice iglu with Nunavik.

  “Something great will come of it,” said Amauraq again. “I know it’s true.”

  Kigiuna lay back down. “Enough talking. Time for sleep.”

  Higilak could not sleep, the platform had grown so cold beside her.

  She sat up, pulling the furs close. Whenever Manatook went away, the iglu was always so chilly and bleak. Her life seemed held in abeyance until his return. The relentless, aching feeling in her heart only made matters worse. And then she realized with a start, her husband had not gone away.

  “Manatook?”

  Squinting into the darkness, she could see the outline of her husband’s back as he kneeled working at some task on the floor of the natiq. She thought she could smell magic in the room.

  “Husband?”

  “You should sleep,” said Old Manatook.

  “It’s cold in this empty bed.”

  He reached over and, with a tap of his finger, sparked the wick of the lamp to life. The seal-oil flared warmly.

  “That’s not what I had in mind,” she said. “What are you doing there?”

  “I worry for Alaana,” said Old Manatook. “I’m making an amulet to help her. Owl feather and eagle feather.”

  “The Walker In The Wind.”

  “Yes.”

  “Sila,” she mused. “Such a restless and uncertain spirit, as the stories tell it.”

  Old Manatook stood, hanging the leather thong of the amulet onto a peg set into the snow wall of the iglu.

  “Sila did not come to her when we were at Uwelen,” he said flatly. “Alaana quieted the dead with her own power but that power has not been replenished. As it fades, her strength goes too.”

  Higilak sighed softly. “It does not go well with her.”

  “She’s growing weaker every day. Her light grows dim and her life is slipping away with it. If Sila has forsaken the girl, she will die.”

  “What can be done?” Higilak asked, holding the furs open so that her husband could crawl inside.

  “Not enough time,” worried Old Manatook. “Never enough time. When spring comes, it will be too late. I must hold the initiation as soon as the light comes again, and no later. And it shall be a true initiation. The girl’s life must be at stake in order to see if Sila is committed to her. There’s no other way. If she can not bring Sila to aid her, then Alaana will die.”

  Higilak pulled her husband close as he settled beneath the furs. Their shoulders touched, their legs intertwined. She nestled her face into the sweep of his long neck. A welcome warmth flowed from him, but his body was so tense.

  “Is she ready?”

  “I don’t know,” he replied in words laden with frustration.

  Higilak drew a deep breath. Manatook cared for Alaana as if she were a daughter. And that was a rare bond indeed, especially for her husband. The couple had never had children of their own. Higilak dearly loved all the children of the Anatatook, had held each of them on her lap at one time or another, made their faces light up with stories of myth and wonder. She helped to educate and teach them, imparting to them truths their real parents couldn’t or wouldn’t dare reveal. As they were each different, she loved them all, Alaana but one among them. But Manatook had no time for children. It had always been Civiliaq who entertained and enlightened the young. Manatook’s time was reserved for more serious matters.

  It was ironic that Manatook, a man who could hold back a raging snowstorm, who could drive demons to ground, and who brought babies down from the sky when barren women were in need, could not persuade the Moon Maid to provide one for himself. He knew Higilak’s suffering on the matter, how she longed for a strong, dutiful son for her husband or, perhaps better yet, a daughter to lighten their hearts. But he had made the matter clear. Such a thing was not possible for them, though heaven and earth themselves be moved.

  And if he believed it impossible, it could not happen.

  “I don’t know if she’s ready,” continued Old Manatook, “but she’s going to have to be tested. Making an amulet to help her. That’s all I can do. I can’t summon her guardian spirit for her.”

  Higilak had never heard her husband speak in such a helpless tone. She knew he had the wisdom to accept defeat when there was no hope for success, such as his inability to provide them a child. Circumstance had never shaken his confidence this way before. The depth of his concern for Alaana had thrown him completely off balance.

  “Why doesn’t Sila ever come when she calls?” asked Old Manatook. “Is it because she’s a girl? Then why did Sila call her in the first place? S
omething is wrong and I don’t know what it is, and I don’t know what to do.”

  Higilak knew what advice her husband would give himself in this situation. “Do what you must. Just believe.”

  “Hmmph,” said Old Manatook. “And then there’s Kigiuna. I know what’s in his heart. I can’t say that I blame him. If Alaana dies, Kigiuna will want blood.”

  Higilak drew back from her husband’s embrace. She needed to see what was in his eyes, but he wouldn’t return her gaze.

  Old Manatook was fixated on the opposite wall of the iglu. “If Alaana dies, I will have to kill Kigiuna or he will kill me.”

  “If he attacks you, you must put him down. Without you, the people will have no shaman…” She paused, holding back from saying what she truly meant. The people would suffer without him, but she would die. She could not go on without her husband, of that she was certain. But she knew Manatook wouldn’t be swayed by such a minor detail as leaving a widow, his primary concern would always be for the Anatatook. “No shaman at all, and then where will they be? You must defend yourself against Kigiuna. It’s his life against all of ours.”

  “Hmmff. Not so.” Old Manatook raised his face so that she could see clearly what was in his heart. Not hesitation. Not weakness. “It’s not that simple. During the test, I am as much a part of the initiation as the girl. I am not separate. As her sponsor and teacher my feelings directly impact the result. If Alaana senses that I am brooding Kigiuna’s destruction, there will be no hope for success. Therefore I must resolve that I shall not kill Kigiuna if it comes to it. He shall kill me.”

  Higilak looked away. She could not stand his resolute stare. As always her husband, the shaman, meant exactly what he said.